The Focus Center - New York (FC-NY) is a
strategic partnership between leading research organizations
in New York State, the New York State government, and the
microelectronics, optoelectronics, bioelectronics, and telecommunication
industries in the U.S. Its aim is to act as a fully integrated,
long-term, visionary research and development (R&D) resource
for the creation of the science and technology base for future
generations of integrated circuitry (IC) products. Its targeted
portfolio of high tech products ranges from the more "traditional"
microprocessor and memory type computer chips to the emerging
areas of biochips, micro- and nano-systems, and ultra-high
frequency communication devices and associated equipment.

FC-NY is a founding member and one of the
three primary sites of the recently created national consortium
known as the Interconnect Focus Center (IFC).The semiconductor
industry has designated this consortium as the centerpiece
in its strategic plan for long-term technology development
and deployment. By tapping into the wealth of creative concepts
and scientific know how that exist at the leading research
universities in the U.S., the IFC will address and resolve
the critical technological challenges that face the semiconductor
industry in the 21st century. From this perspective, the IFC
is a new paradigm in semiconductor science and technology
development and implementation. The influential presence that
FC-NY enjoys within the IFC allows it to exploit a vast array
of intellectual, technical, political and financial resources
at the national and international levels to place New York
in a uniquely favorable position in its quest to attract and
retain high tech industry.

Within the academic community, FC-NY was established as an
equal partnership between the two prime research institutions
in microelectronics in New York, namely, the University at
Albany-SUNY (UAlbany) and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
(RPI), with headquarters at the Center for Environmental Sciences
and Technology Management (CESTM) at UAlbany. Participation
by other NYS research institutions is encouraged on a project-by-project
basis, as mandated by scientific and technical needs, and
recommended by appropriate academic and industrial advisory
boards. The driving strategy of FC-NY in its first three years
of existence is to build the critical mass required and assemble
the scientific and technical capabilities needed to establish
FC-NY as the preeminent R&D center in the U.S. for microelectronics,
optoelectronics, bioelectronics, and telecommunication technologies.
The achievement of this goal is critical to the establishment
of an intellectual power base and state-of-the-art infrastructure
within FC-NY to serve as a new paradigm for high tech research
and development that would replace the now antiquated model
of industrially-based R&D laboratories.